BIOPLASM HAVING DIED CANNOT LIVE AGAIN. 11 



properties result. These substances belong to four 

 different classes of bodies. One separates spon- 

 taneously soon after death. Another is a transparent 

 fluid, which is coagulated by heat and nitric acid. 

 The third consists of fatty matter ; and, the fourth, 

 comprises certain saline substances. When a mass 

 of bioplasm dies it is in fact resolved into 1, fibrin;- 

 2, albumen ; 3, fatty matter ; and 4, salts. These 

 things do not exist in the matter when it is bioplasm, 

 but as the latter dies it splits up into these four 

 classes of compounds. 



18. Bioplasm having died cannot live again. 

 Once dead, bioplasm ceases to be bioplasm, and is 

 resolved into other things ; but these things that are 

 formed cannot be put together again to reform the 

 bioplasm. They may be taken up by new bioplasm, 

 and so converted into living matter ; but the bioplasm 

 that existed once can never exist again. All bio- 

 plasm must die, but re-living is, as far as we know, 

 impossible, and scientifically is inconceivable. 



19. A crystal may be re-crystallised. A crystal 

 may be dissolved in water and new crystals formed, 

 but a particle of bioplasm can no more be dissolved and 

 reformed than a man can be dissolved and re- crystal- 

 lised. The difference between living matter and life- 

 less matter between bioplasm and the things which 

 result from its death, is absolute. The change from 

 one state to another is sudden and complete. 



20. A magnet may toe re-magnetized. The steel 

 of which a magnet is composed can undoubtedly be 

 unmagnetized and re-magnetized as often as we will ; 

 bnt the analogy which Prof. Owen has sought to 

 establish between the magnetized steel, and the living 

 organism is surely most fanciful. What two things 

 are more unlike than a piece of steel and a dead 

 organism, and what phenomena that we know of have 

 less in common than magnetic phenomena and vital 

 phenomena ? 



